Court to pronounce order on May 16 on summoning Shinde

New Delhi: A Delhi court on Tuesday deferred to May 16 its order on whether to summon Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde in connection with a defamation case filed against him for his 'Hindu terror' remark. Metropolitan magistrate Amitabh Rawat, who had called the complainant to deliver the order after the counsel completed the arguments, postponed the date to May 16 saying the order was not ready.

The court had already recorded the pre-summoning evidence of petitioner VP Kumar after it heard his counsel Monika Arora who had alleged that the home minister had "wilfully" made the "derogatory" remarks to cause "ill will and hatred among communities".

A petition filed says Shinde's remarks were aimed at "polarising minority votes" in the 2014 general elections.

Kumar, in his petition, alleged that Shinde's remarks were aimed at "polarising minority votes" in the 2014 general elections. "The impugned statement is not only defamatory in its natural meaning but also contains the imputation and insinuation that Hindu religion is involved in anti-national and terrorist activities," the petition said, adding the minister "has used the word saffron as synonym of terrorism, which is totally absurd, wrong, mischievous and defamatory".

According to the petition, Shinde while addressing an AICC meeting at Jaipur earlier this year, had said "...We have got an investigation report that be it RSS or BJP, their training camps are promoting Hindu terrorism. We are keeping a strict vigil on all this."